Wow I haven't posted on this thread in a long time. Lots of changes happened in 2015 mainly to make maintenance easier for me.

I re-plumbed the pumps with quick disconnects so I don't have to get in the water in spring and fall to disconnect the pumps anymore.

I raised the skippy filters adding clean out valves at the bottom and quick disconnects for draining along with air stones in the bottom of the filters.

I built a deck over the skippies to hide them, with easy access panels.

I expanded the bog at the top of the falls by about double the size and plumbed water outlets under the gravel. The bog is now filtering much more than it ever did and with the skippies my filtration is more than enough.

I have also been slowly reducing my fish population by donating them to a local pond store. I am down to 9 Koi and about 10 comets. Hopefully all have all the comets gone next spring. Goal it to limit the pond to only specific koi I really like and keeping the population well below what the pond and filtration can handle.

Clear water at all times no fish issues.

Here are some picture from throughout the year.

This was in the spring after the plumbing and bog change but before the deck.

These were in May I believe after all changes were done and plants started growing. Showing the finished deck.

Pecan it's stunning. So your bog is plumbed from the bottom and then you have the skippy filters that also flow over the top of the bog into the pond? Also your falls, it looks like the 1st level is 1 concrete block high and then the bog is 2 concrete blocks high is that right?
We are looking at redoing our bog and filtration and I'd like to add more bog to mine, thinking about doing another level, somewhat similar to this.

Pecan it's stunning. So your bog is plumbed from the bottom and then you have the skippy filters that also flow over the top of the bog into the pond? Also your falls, it looks like the 1st level is 1 concrete block high and then the bog is 2 concrete blocks high is that right?
We are looking at redoing our bog and filtration and I'd like to add more bog to mine, thinking about doing another level, somewhat similar to this.

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Thanks you! and yes the skippies overflow into the top of the bog and there is plumbing under the bog with water pushing up through the gravel. The first level of the falls is a mound of dirt put there from the original pond dig, with 1 layer of cinder block up to the second level.

I ended up raising the outer edge of the bog about 6" above the gravel level (using 2" pink foam stacked on top of each other until I got it high enough) which was a good thing because once late summer rolled around, all the plants had filled in the water in the bog raised to almost overflowing. Had I not done that before I built the patio over the skippies it would have been difficult to do after the fact.

At first we just had a water fall and then I added skippies to have some filtration. I chose skippies over a bog because I didn't want to take up a large amount of space. Abt 2012

Then I started planting plants in and around the waterfall and liked it so much I wanted more so I created a small bog but no plumbing underneath, just the skippy water flowing over the top. Abt 2013

I also had a third hose running straight to the pond. So this year I figured why not make the bog even bigger and run that third hose to plumbing under the bog. I was already planning on making changes for ease of maintenance so I figured do it all at once.

We've missed you and your gorgeous pond photographs!!! You've been hard at work...it all looks stunning

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Thanks Tula! We had the big construction project (addition to the house) going from 2013 till the end of 2014 which we ended up doing ourselves. Since I had to buy a bunch of tools (air compressor, guns, saws, etc) and the construction is now done, I have been running around like a little kid with tools in my hands looking for things to do with them. LOL. They made the deck project easy.

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